Just to See You Smile
by weirdgirl42
Summary: A series of vignettes of Coulson and May's shared history based loosely on the song "Just to See You Smile" by Tim McGraw. Warning, major angst ahead.


_Disclaimer: I don't own nuttin'_

**Just to see you smile**

Coulson doesn't remember the first time he met her. He's sure it must have been at some point during the first few days at the academy. He can remember meeting so many people in quick succession but he can't pick out the moment someone introduced them or he introduced himself (even back then it would have been very strange for her to speak first), he doesn't remember first shaking her hand or when their eyes first met.

What he does remember is the first time she ever smiled at him. It was during a mission, he doesn't remember if it was their first one together. An ops team had been sent into Patras. It had been him, Barton, Hand, May, and a few more people he didn't remember. After the mission was over they were extracted to Athens for debriefing.

By the time they were dismissed and given their hotel room keys they'd all been awake over 48 hours. Coulson slogged towards the cheap motel room he was sharing with Barton, May moving more gracefully along next time. Before heading into his room he remembers turning towards her and asking, "Do you think they have his and Hercules towels in a place like this?"

Maybe it was the lack of sleep, maybe the question had just taken her by surprise, but what he remembers is that for the first time since the mission started, May looked at him and grinned before continuing on to her own room.

He stood outside the door watching her walk away for longer than he'd admit. In that moment he realized he'd do just about anything to see her smile.

XXXXXXXXXX

"What do you know about May?"

Barton looked over at him, raising an eyebrow and smiling slightly. "May huh?" They were sitting next to each other on the flight back from Athens. May and Hand were a few rows up and various other SHIELD agents were mixed in with the normal passengers. The original plan had been a SHIELD cargo transport but something more pressing had called the plane away and the team was left to fly commercial back to the states.

Coulson rolled his eyes and tried to keep the blush from his face. "Not like that. I just realized I don't really know anything about her. You and she worked together in Kosovo right?"

Barton shrugged. "Don't know much. Think her mother is CIA or something like that. She was the top of her academy class in combat. Doesn't talk much. I think I heard a story that she once dyed Agent King's hair pink in his sleep. Not sure if that's true. Oh, and she was seeing Anderson for a while."

"Emil Anderson? Really?"

Barton smiled again.

Coulson tried to backtrack, "No I just mean…he's…he's such a…"

Barton's smile widened at his obvious discomfort. "A pretty boy?" he suggested.

"Yeah," Coulson said.

"Well maybe she likes pretty boys."

Coulson felt his shoulders sag a little. "Yeah," he repeated, turning to stare out the window.

"Well either way," Barton said, "I hope we get to keep working with her. She's the best I've ever seen."

"Me too," Coulson said. "Me too.

XXXXXXXXXX

"Absolutely not."

"Oh come on Phil, don't be such a tight ass."

Coulson looked at her incredulously. "Seriously? A tight ass? Because I don't want to throw water balloons at agency cadets? I feel like the correct term would be 'grown adult.'"

"I don't know why you're still arguing with me," May said, reaching out to hand him a balloon from the laundry basket-full she'd brought up to the roof. "We both know how this is going to end."

Coulson sighed and took the balloon from her, feeling his chest tighten when she smiled at him. He really couldn't tell her no.

XXXXXXXXXX

Coulson was pacing. May sat stoically at his kitchen table watching.

"Are you out of your mind?" he asked. "Why would you agree to this?"

"The Beijing headquarters needs people and I already speak the language. It makes sense."

"We've been in New York for five years May," Coulson said. "Ever since we got promoted to level 4. You, me, Clint, I thought the plan was two more years here and then DC. Go to the Hub and actually get to run Ops for a while. Speaking of which, what does Clint have to say about all this?"

"He told me to go. Said he's thinking about taking some time off to teach at the academy anyway. I think he wants to keep an eye on Romanov."

Coulson let out a breath and sat down across from her. "This is what you want?" he asked.

May nodded.

"Okay," he said, shrugging. "I'll fill out the transfer paperwork tomorrow."

May's eyes widened and she stared at him.

"What?" he asked, his mouth quirking, "you think I'd let you go alone?"

She smiled at him and his stomach fluttered. Then she leaned over and kissed him and his heart nearly exploded in his chest.

XXXXXXXXXX

"This is our best chance and you know it Phil."

"Mel," he sighed. "I can't just go to Fury and demand that he send us and a team in. You know that's not how it works."

May glared at him from across the conference room. They'd just finished a briefing on an escalating situation in Bahrain. Someone on the index had gone rogue and there were hostages involved. The current plan was for SHIELD to provide extraction support to the UN peacekeepers and negotiators.

May did not believe this plan was sufficient.

They had been back in Washington for almost two years now, after spending five in China. Coulson had to admit, Beijing hadn't been all bad. Days like this especially he missed their little apartment (technically it was her apartment, he had a different address on file with SHIELD but that was just on paper). Sure they had an apartment here too but they were both more on guard now. In China he'd never really worried about getting caught and split up, now it was constantly on his mind.

"Phil you and I both know what Alawi is capable of. The UN isn't going to be able to handle him. People are going to die."

Coulson pinched the bridge of his nose. He knew she was right. But that didn't mean he could do what she was asking.

"Fury trusts you," May continued. "If you get in his face about this, he'll agree."

"And what if I don't want to get in his face about this? What if I think sending us in is also a bad idea? We do both know what Alawi is capable of and I'm not sure I want you anywhere near him again. Not after last time."

They were silent for a while, staring at each other. Coulson was the first to look away.

"Please Phil," May said quietly. "I let him go. If he hurts those people…"

Coulson sighed. "Okay," he relented.

She gave him a small smile and even after seven years together he still felt his stomach flutter.

XXXXXXXXXX

"I can't stay," she whispered.

"I know," he replied.

It was dark in their bedroom. He had been asleep when she came it. It was the first time she'd been home in days. The world had fallen apart after Bahrain. Nothing he said, nothing she did ever seemed to make it better.

"I can't get it out of my head," she continued. "And when I look at you…I just…"

"I understand." They were silent for a long time, sitting in the dark on opposite sides of the bed. "I love you," he said, because there was nothing else to say.

"I know. I love you too. But it isn't enough."

He nodded. He wished she would talk to him. He wished she would let him hold her. He wished she would look at him and smile.

XXXXXXXXXX

He heard that she'd gotten married. Even five years after Bahrain, when Clint told him it still felt like a punch to the gut. Coulson knew Clint had told him out of concern. Maria was throwing a party to celebrate being named second in command. There was no way he couldn't go, and there was no way she wouldn't be there too.

So here he was standing at the bar, half-listening to Sitwell talk about…something and mostly watching the door. And then, there she was. If he had been living in a movie, she would look exactly the same and their eyes would meet and her husband would be an ogre. But this wasn't a movie. She didn't look quite the same. Her face was harder than he remembered, the pain from Bahrain was still there. She was just as beautiful as she had always been, the same black pants and leather jacket, but some of the light was still missing from her eyes.

The man who stood next to her, Andrew, he remembered Clint had said, wasn't an ogre. He was a pretty boy, just like the ones she had gone through during the academy and in the first years of Ops. Blond hair, blue eyes, and Coulson was pretty sure he could see the six pack under the other man's t-shirt.

She didn't see him. She and Andrew went over to where Maria was standing and spoke with her for a while. Then they talked with Fury and Hand and several other agents. Coulson, on the other hand, found that his eyes wouldn't leave her for long. He watched how she moved, how she spoke. When Andrew's hand went to the small of her back, he saw how she would flash her husband a smile but then move forward or to the side so that his hand was never on her for long. Coulson saw how her smiles never seemed to reach her eyes.

Eventually, Clint had been right it was inevitable, Coulson found himself face to face with them.

"Agent May," he said, raising his glass in greeting. May gave him a look that clearly said 'so this is how we're handling this?' He gave a tiny shrug in response. No one in this room, except for Clint, knew that they had been together for more than half a decade.

"Agent Coulson," she replied, her tone measured. "This is Andrew McCauley. Andrew this is Phil Coulson…we…we worked together for a very long time."

Everything in him wanted to punch Andrew in the face, grab May in his arms and kiss her until she forgot that pretty-boy had ever existed. But Coulson saw how her shoulders tensed, he saw the fear in her eyes. He remembered that day on the roof of the academy when she'd handed him a water balloon, her eyes alight with mischief. He remembered holding her in the shower after Bahrain when she was convinced the blood would never come off.

So he didn't kiss her. And he didn't punch Andrew. Instead, he held out his hand and smiled. "Nice to meet you Andrew. I hear congratulations are in order."

"Hey thanks man," Andrew said, grinning wildly in a way that did not make Coulson want to punch him less. So he dropped the other man's hand and turned to look at May.

"It's wonderful," he said, staring into her eyes, his stomach burning with the lie. "I'm really happy for you guys."

He saw May's shoulders relax. She reached out and touched his shoulder. "Thanks Phil," she said.

She smiled then, and he saw a tiny spark in her eyes. In that moment he knew, he'd lie again and again for the rest of his life if it meant that she was smiling.

**The End**

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